Canada’s Olympians displayed perseverance

The 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang cannot be qualified as anything but an unequivocal success for Team Canada. Our 29 medals represent an all time high for us — three better than the 26 that we were able to win at Vancouver 2010, now surprisingly eight years ago.

Having said that, though, these Games once again proved that the question of “How many?” is far less important than the question of “How were they won?” The answer to this question provides the key to understanding the true story of the Games for Canada, and the fabric of our very identity.

Take the example of Mark McMorris, a world champion snowboarder who suffered lifethreatening injuries less than a year before the Olympics. McMorris persevered through this adversity, though, and somehow ended up back on the podium with another bronze medal in slopestyle.

Who could forget the story of Kim Boutin? She won Canada’s first medal in short track speedskating, which was at the expense of a Korean skater who was disqualified. As a result, she was the target of online threats from irate Korean fans. However, Boutin endured, and her mental toughness allowed her to win two more medals, giving her the wellearned right to become Canada’s flag bearer at the closing ceremonies.

Finally, following great disappointment in Sochi four years earlier, Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir reached the mountaintop one more time, winning two gold medals for their breathtaking ice dance and giving them a storybook ending.

While many other athletes, such Laurie Blouin, Wojtek Wolski and Ted-Jan Bloemen, also impressed us with similar stories over these past 17 days, the common thread in all their stories is that our Canadian heroes pushed through very difficult circumstances to find success. Now, as the focus now shifts towards Beijing, Canada is left wondering where our medal count can go from here.

Additionally, with a possible bid from Calgary for the 2026 Winter Olympics, there is a real possibility that we could find ourselves at the centre of the world’s biggest stage again very soon. However, in all of this, all it takes to silence our worries is to follow the example of our incredible athletes: to persevere, courageously step forward, and never give up. Is there anything that truly encompasses the Olympic spirit more than this? There is not, and that is exactly why these Games were one of Canada’s most successful.

Zachary Hampton

Lethbridge